Skip to main content

Home/ Advanced Concepts Team/ Group items tagged news

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Luís F. Simões

Shell energy scenarios to 2050 - 6 views

  •  
    just in case you were feeling happy and optimistic
  • ...7 more comments...
  •  
    An energy scenario published by an oil company? Allow me to be sceptical...
  •  
    Indeed, Shell is an energy company, not just oil, for some time now ... The two scenarii are, in their approach, dependant of economic and political situation, which is right now impossible to forecast. Reference to Kyoto is surprising, almost out-dated! But overall, I find it rather optimistic at some stages, and probably the timeline (p37-39) is unlikely with recent events.
  •  
    the report was published in 2008, which explains the reference to Kyoto, as the follow-up to it was much more uncertain at that point. The Blueprint scenario is indeed optimistic, but also quite unlikely I'd say. I don't see humanity suddenly becoming so wise and coordinated. Sadly, I see something closer to the Scramble scenario as much more likely to occur.
  •  
    not an oil company??? please have a look at the percentage of their revenues coming from oil and gas and then compare this with all their other energy activities together and you will see very quickly that it is only window dressing ... they are an oil and gas company ... and nothing more
  •  
    not JUST oil. From a description: "Shell is a global group of energy and petrochemical companies." Of course revenues coming from oil are the biggest, the investment turnover on other energy sources is small for now. Knowing that most of their revenues is from an expendable source, to guarantee their future, they invest elsewhere. They have invested >1b$ in renewable energy, including biofuels. They had the largest wind power business among so-called "oil" companies. Oil only defines what they do "best". As a comparison, some time ago, Apple were selling only computers and now they sell phones. But I would not say Apple is just a phone company.
  •  
    window dressing only ... e.g. Net cash from operating activities (pre-tax) in 2008: 70 Billion$ net income in 2008: 26 Billion revenues in 2008: 88 Billion Their investments and revenues in renewables don't even show up in their annual financial reports since probably they are under the heading of "marketing" which is already 1.7 Billion $ ... this is what they report on their investments: Capital investment, portfolio actions and business development Capital investment in 2009 was $24 billion. This represents a 26% decrease from 2008, which included over $8 billion in acquisitions, primarily relating to Duvernay Oil Corp. Capital investment included exploration expenditure of $4.5 billion (2008: $11.0 billion). In Abu Dhabi, Shell signed an agreement with Abu Dhabi National Oil Company to extend the GASCO joint venture for a further 20 years. In Australia, Shell and its partners took the final investment decision (FID) for the Gorgon LNG project (Shell share 25%). Gorgon will supply global gas markets to at least 2050, with a capacity of 15 million tonnes (100% basis) of LNG per year and a major carbon capture and storage scheme. Shell has announced a front-end engineering and design study for a floating LNG (FLNG) project, with the potential to deploy these facilities at the Prelude offshore gas discovery in Australia (Shell share 100%). In Australia, Shell confirmed that it has accepted Woodside Petroleum Ltd.'s entitlement offer of new shares at a total cost of $0.8 billion, maintaining its 34.27% share in the company; $0.4 billion was paid in 2009 with the remainder paid in 2010. In Bolivia and Brazil, Shell sold its share in a gas pipeline and in a thermoelectric power plant and its related assets for a total of around $100 million. In Canada, the Government of Alberta and the national government jointly announced their intent to contribute $0.8 billion of funding towards the Quest carbon capture and sequestration project. Quest, which is at the f
  •  
    thanks for the info :) They still have their 50% share in the wind farm in Noordzee (you can see it from ESTEC on a clear day). Look for Shell International Renewables, other subsidiaries and joint-ventures. I guess, the report is about the oil branch. http://sustainabilityreport.shell.com/2009/servicepages/downloads/files/all_shell_sr09.pdf http://www.noordzeewind.nl/
  •  
    no - its about Shell globally - all Shell .. these participations are just peanuts please read the intro of the CEO in the pdf you linked to: he does not even mention renewables! their entire sustainability strategy is about oil and gas - just making it (look) nicer and environmentally friendlier
  •  
    Fair enough, for me even peanuts are worthy and I am not able to judge. Not all big-profit companies, like Shell, are evil :( Look in the pdf what is in the upstream and downstream you mentionned above. Non-shell sources for examples and more objectivity: http://www.nuon.com/company/Innovative-projects/noordzeewind.jsp http://www.e-energymarket.com/news/single-news/article/ferrari-tops-bahrain-gp-using-shell-biofuel.html thanks.
Juxi Leitner

NASA Nebula News: September 2009 | SpaceRef - Space News as it Happens - 0 views

  •  
    NASA Nebula News: September 2009 - SpaceRef
nikolas smyrlakis

Being a walking hot-spot | Geek Gestalt - CNET News - 0 views

  •  
    marek's new gadget after the ha-wi-fi t-shirt
ESA ACT

On Orbit | Social Space News and Networking - 0 views

shared by ESA ACT on 24 Apr 09 - Cached
  •  
    A new social space news and networking site.
ESA ACT

BBC NEWS | Science & Environment | Climate damage science studied - 0 views

  •  
    Something for our new Earth Systems Science position to look at
ESA ACT

Colours light up brain structure : Nature News - 0 views

  •  
    A new and amazing method for neuron staining.
Juxi Leitner

Google's Go: A New Programming Language That's Python Meets C++ - 6 views

  •  
    Big news for developers out there: Google has just announced the release of a new, open sourced programming language called Go. The company ...
  • ...2 more comments...
  •  
    Ugh... no operator overloading, no efficient generic programming and no lambda expressions... Only time will tell, but I don't understand who the intended audience is: I think that Python guys won't care about the (supposedly) increased performance (and you can interface C/C++ with Python easily) and that C++ programmers (I mean, the hardcore serious C++ Boost-like programmers, no the Java-like whiners :P) won't have their beloved templates pried from their cold dead hands with ease.
  •  
    yeah though I think especially operator overloading is not going to be a main problem, it is as with the JS library though quite thinkable that lots of users will switch or use it (or being put to use it...) because it is done by Google
  •  
    Having Google backing it will certainly help, even though they are presenting it as a "system level" (i.e., hard-core) language, and in that domain it is much more difficult to bullshit your way to a position of relevance. Look at Java: Sun pushed it like hell and it is certainly widely used in many contexts (corporate, web and embedded markets mostly), yet it completely failed to win the hearts of "open-source" developers (or, more generally, of those developers who are not forced to use it by virtue of some management-driven decision).
  •  
    "or, more generally, of those developers who are not forced to use it by virtue of some management-driven decision" completely agree with that!!
santecarloni

Three electrons for the price of one - physicsworld.com - 0 views

  •  
    Researchers have created a new material that can produce three or more free electrons every time it absorbs a single photon. This is unlike conventional semiconductors, which produce just one free electron per photon. Based on tiny semiconductor structures called quantum dots, the new material - developed by researchers at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and Toyota Europe in Belgium - could someday be used to make more efficient solar cells.
annaheffernan

Laser shines a new light on isotope separation - 0 views

  •  
    A new method of separating nuclear isotopes that exploits the slight differences in their electronic energy levels has been developed by physicists in the US. The energy-efficient separator was used to create isotopically pure lithium-7, which is used in some nuclear reactors. Good news for any future nuclear powered space missions perhaps? It could potentially replace the current (and much less energy efficient) methods that were developed in the 1950's
jcunha

Experimental evidence for new Flexo-electric nanomaterial - 1 views

  •  
    A new experiment proved the existence of a new effect in nanomaterials: flexo-electric effect. The material has built-in mechanical tension that changes shape when you apply electrical voltage, or that generates electricity if you change its shape and was theorized some decades ago. Now, SrTiO3 allowed to observe this new effect, being comparable with piezoelectric effect.
  •  
    My old twente university group! :)
  •  
    Isn't muscle wire quite old technology though?
Nina Nadine Ridder

Can physical exercise enhance long-term memory? - 1 views

  •  
    Exercise can enhance the development of new brain cells in the adult brain, a process called adult neurogenesis. These newborn brain cells play an important role in learning and memory. A new study has determined that mice that spent time running on wheels not only developed twice the normal number of new neurons, but also showed an increased ability to distinguish new objects from familiar objects.
  •  
    wow ... time to start running again ...
Guido de Croon

New theory allows drones to see distances with one eye - 2 views

  •  
    Inspired by the work that was done at the ACT, I continued working on optical flow landing at TU Delft. Today Bio & Bio published my article on a new theory that allows drones to see distances with a single camera. It shows that drones approaching an object with an insect-inspired vision strategy become unstable at a specific distance from the object. Turning this weakness into a strength, drones can actually use the timely detection of that instability to estimate distance. The new theory will enable further miniaturization of autonomous drones and provides a new hypothesis on flying insect behavior. Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fm7SMJp8EA4&feature=youtu.be Article: http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-3190/11/1/016004
Dario Izzo

New Enzyme Rewrites the Genome - 2 views

  •  
    Exciting new technique in genetic engineering
Dario Izzo

Tabby's Star 2017 update: 'Alien megastructure' doing weird things again - 1 views

  •  
    Its doing it again. Anyone wants to play the "explain this" game?
  •  
    New debates on 'old' topic: https://phys.org/news/2018-01-alien-megastructure-dimming-mysterious-star.html? see blog posts in link for more info
LeopoldS

Internet billionaire ponies up more cash for physics prizes : Nature News Blog - 1 views

  •  
    good news for the theoretical physicists ...
Dario Izzo

Global Climate Models Powered by Intel® Xeon Phi™ Coprocessors - 1 views

  •  
    NASA has it ... I WANT IT TOO!!!! 240 threads on 60 cores ... Imagine the possibilities of this new toy!! Francesco also has it in his new "kill the seals" job
Luís F. Simões

Physicists Discover a Whopping 13 New Solutions to Three-Body Problem - ScienceNOW - 1 views

  • The discovery of 13 new families, made by physicists Milovan Šuvakov and Veljko Dmitrašinović at the University of Belgrade, brings the new total to 16.
  • All the solutions can be viewed online
  •  
    They search numerically for initial conditions resulting in periodic orbits. Reminds to me the methods we employed for the "search for invariant relative motion" and which brought us to discover the magic inclinations (47.9 degrees). I wonder what are the implications. In any case nice plots :)
  •  
    Haven't read in detail, but it's not clear to me what it means exactly. If they were discovered numerically (I assume it means via numerical integration), how can they be sure the orbits are truly periodic?
johannessimon81

A New Class of Faint Supernova - 0 views

  •  
    The type is much weaker than normal supernovas and seems to have a new mechanism underlying it.
LeopoldS

NASA - NASA-NOAA Satellite Reveals New Views of Earth at Night - 3 views

  •  
    very nice new images from Earth at night
jcunha

New rules for robots backed by European Parliament committee - 1 views

  •  
    The European Parliament's Legal Affairs Committee voted in favour of a resolution calling for new laws addressing robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) to be set out to sit alongside a new voluntary ethical conduct code that would apply to developers and designers.
‹ Previous 21 - 40 of 1930 Next › Last »
Showing 20 items per page